The Military Forces of Kalgachia are composed of four distinct elements; the Kalgachi Defence Force, the Prefects' Border Guard Service, the Church Partisans and the Northbloom Dragoons. In total war conditions Kalgachia is capable of mobilising some 4.7 million people into these combat arms, amounting to one quarter of its entire population.

Overview

The KDF has risen from its origins as a posse of glorified hamster herders to aspirations of viable defence against the first-rank armies of Micras.

The Kalgachi Defence Force (KDF) is the standing army of Kalgachia, whose full-time component amounts to two Field Corps supported by specialised fortress, air assault and special operations units. Drawing upon the doctrinal and technological legacy of the highly-developed Minarborian military-industrial complex, whose expertise it inherited almost wholesale, the KDF is the second-largest organ of Kalgachi state behind the Church of Kalgachia and by far the most heavily resourced - its remit of territorial defence, for a nation directly adjacent to the immense Imperial Forces of Shireroth, is arguably the most demanding on Micras and the proximity of the Shirerithian behemoth, viewed through the horticulturally holistic lens of the Deep Singers and their Nezeni successors, is viewed by the Kalgachi Central War College as a necessary and ultimately beneficial manifestation of 'evolutionary pressure' which sustains the combat capability of the KDF at greater level than the Micran average and lends it some protection against degenerative social tendencies at home.

The familiarity of the Kalgachi soldier with the spectre of death is maintained by the sustained operational tempo arising from the containment of Tyrannocricetus aliger (the notorious Tee-al), whose main habitat is located in the Kalgachi south but ultimately ranges throughout the country and beyond.

Ground Doctrine

In the face of overwhelmingly superior Shirerithian firepower, KDF doctrine places a heavy emphasis on rhizomic antifragility and swarm theory, dispersing points of failure as much as possible and effectively relegating centralised command to the preperatory phase of war in anticipation of its destruction or loss of communication during actual hostilities, requiring a high degree of territorial familiarity and individual initiative on the part of junior and mid-ranking officers to compensate for the shortfall. This extends to the KDF's logistical structure which emphasises short supply lines around a multitude of small covert arms dumps - usually guarded, administered and shared with local partisans - whose contents are supplied from deep underground munitions factories in peacetime and periodically rotated back underground for maintenance. While theoretically beneficial in a home defence scenario, reliance on such an arrangement does entail a substantial dropoff in KDF unit endurance on unfamiliar or hostile ground, for instance in large expeditionary operations. The only exceptions to this are the cossack units and special forces who are trained to obtain what little they need from bushcraft and/or plunder, and air assault units whose mobility extends to their logistical arrangements.

On a tactical level the KDF emphasises close integration with reservists and local partisans, helping the latter forces to harrass and distract the heavy spearheads of an invading army whilst the greater part of the KDF's own offensive power is devoted to the sustained and aggressive degradation of the enemy rear echelon, diverting the enemy from its primary objective of ground capture and retention whilst retarding the establishment of a functional occupation regime within ground it does control. With the exception of mounted and air units the KDF operates with a slow but constant mobility, using areas of thick vegetation and topographic hollows to locate and infiltrate small gaps in any front line or rear-echelon dragnet the enemy attempts to establish. The notion of permanently conceding ground, in a nation of Kalgachia's size and position, is considered futile regardless of the temporary benefits - therefore the entire country is considered a viable operational area regardless of the strategic situation, and the tactic of retreat by forward infiltration is considered imperative. Visual concealment and emissions control is an important aspect of this, assisted by items of kit such as the 'snuggly' - a quilted insulating sheet which, when not used as a blanket for sleeping out the cold Kalgachi nights, can be worn as a cape for reducing troops' infrared signature while on the move.

In active battle KDF commanders are taught to close hard with the enemy to negate the latter's air and artillery capability and under no circumstances allow themselves to be pinned down at distance - or at least to disengage and move quickly from their position of first contact where an unfavourable disparity of firepower is apparent. The KDF's underground units, equipped with submachine guns, shotguns, flamethrowers and other close range weaponry, show a particular enthusiasm - and allegedly aptitude - for this type of intimate battle, whether underground or on the surface.

Like its predecessors in Minarboria, the KDF work to integrate an effective anti-air and anti-tank defence down to the company or troop level and a robust electronic warfare capability, although the application of these in Kalgachia's rugged topography has necessitated much head-scratching by military planners with regard to the field disassembly and transport of larger systems by pack horse or helicopter.

Air Doctrine

From its creation, the KDF has renounced aspirations to air supremacy in view of the asset expense measured against the superiority of the probable opposition - a position vindicated by the commanding performance of Shirerithian air assets in the War of Lost Brothers. In the air - as on land - the emphasis is on denial rather than control. This is offered by Kalgachia's sprawling air defence systems, composed of the tried and tested Minarborian surface-to-air missiles - the Sciarid MANPADS for short range, the Dandelion for medium range and the Burdock for long ranges extending to the edge of the Micran atmosphere. The latter, relying on active radar, operates with a cryptographically-determined, millisecond-range signal shift in the variables of frequency, pulse rate, amplitude and switch interval which themselves are duplicated across four unique channels, offering some resilience against spoofing or repeater jamming and, when linked with the signal refractors of friendly electronic warfare units, against wide-spectrum anti-radiation missiles. The Dandelion missile lacks this capability although its own active radar mode is generally an unused backup to its passive seekers which can operate in infrared, or utilise the Minarborian technology of ionised air homing which locks on to the electromagnetic burst of compressed air on rotor tips or the leading edges of transonic/supersonic fixed-wing aircraft. The seeker of the Sciarid missile is limited to infrared owing to its small size - although it does have an unguided firing option to provoke evasive manoeuvre, act as an infrared decoy or even attempt a lucky hit.

Owing to its difficult terrain, Kalgachia's military logistics are unmechanised by design.

Kalgachia's military electronics are designed with resilience in mind - most are deliberately retro affairs of vacuum tubes, nixie displays or even clockwork that can be repaired in the field with pliers and a soldering iron without going to the trouble of replacing a whole unit or finding the air-filtered, static-free clean room required to work on microcircuitry. Such components also have a degree of innate EMP hardening, although the deficit in processing power compared with more complex miniaturised systems inevitably seeks compensation by the human brain, requiring a more intensive training regime for operators and a larger number of operators overall.

Before 194 AL the KDF's air defence assets operated on the standing instruction that all aircraft in Kalgachi airspace more than 3000 metres above the local ground level, unless explicit orders had been received to let them pass, were to be engaged and destroyed without warning. Over time this resulted in a series of accidents, usually involving non-instrument-rated pilots who found themselves in the impossible dilemma of flying into cloud and potentially striking a hidden mountain, or else climbing above the weather only to be blasted out of the sky. After much rancorous deliberation, Kalgachia's ruling Council of Perfecti eventually approved the import of a single squadron of Buzzard C-61 fighter jets from Kasterburg on the condition that they be limited to a peacetime air policing and special operations role, mindful of their uselessness in a total war scenario as their only available runway would likely be a prime target for enemy saturation strikes in the opening minutes of any such conflict.

The outsourcing of the Buzzards' maintenance burden to Kasterburg as part of the import agreement allows their Kalgachi pilots to train on an intensive, full-time basis by freely sacrificing airframe hours for pilot hours, resulting in maximum combat readiness and serving as a high-performance skill pool for the wider Kalgachi aviation community. Pilots of the Buzzards' operating unit, the Special Purpose Regiment, have found that this higher-than-average skill level is essential to fly the stub-winged aircraft, noting its violent proclivity for fatal stalls or spins at even modest angles of attack, the unpredictable effect of external payloads upon its handling characteristics in the transonic range, and runway instability due to its narrow landing gear configuration and the unusually high speeds required for takeoff and landing. The aircraft's limitations constrain its role in Kalgachi service to straight-run intercepts, reconnaissance missions, single-pass ground strikes and electronic operations with any attempts at dogfighting, close ground support or other manoeuvre operations considered an unacceptable risk to trained pilots and aircraft which were obtained at considerable expense to the state.

Close air support in the KDF is provided by the Whirdlebirb, originally a gunship of Babkhan origin whose blueprints were discovered by the Minarborians during an archeological expedition to an Ashkenatzan bunker and rebuilt in modified form. The Kalgachi variant of the Whirdlebirb can carry a variety of armaments, or up to twelve troops or a combination thereof, although the use of mounted weapons while carrying exterior passengers on its exterior seating has led to unfortunate incidents in the past. Kalgachia's mountain topography offers a sea of radar clutter or complete shielding in which the KDF's Whirdlebirbs, flying low and slow, aim to achieve some degree of survivability in contested airspace.

Independent Units

Fortress Division

The Fortress Division is tasked with operating Kalgachia's network of underground combat installations. These are built to one of three specifications - A, B, or Ludd. The A and B installations are large, embrasured weapon platforms built into steep mountainsides overlooking points of strategic importance such as cities or mountain passes. The considerably smaller Ludd sites house the KDF's inventory of medium-range ballistic missiles - these are fed with a constantly-updated stream of targeting data from civil and military intelligence sources which provide, in the event of hostilities on the border, an instant and targeted strike capability into Kalgachia's immediate abroad.

The largely static nature of the Fortress Division has allowed it to commission unique weapons systems such as an extended-range version of the Malus anti-gravtank missile (Malus-ER), essentially a standard Malus fitted with a booster stage which extends its hypersonic boost phase to a range of 5 kilometres for engagements at distance. Specification A fortresses are also equipped with the Neaptide Gravimetric Countermeasure System, a disruptive beam generator which is nominally operational but remains experimental in nature and is subject to frequent upgrades.

For supporting actions in areas without emplaced weapons, the Fortress Division operates three artillery trains with integrated area defence capability.

-Looking North over Oktayvan's Northeast approaches
-Looking North over Oktavyan proper
-Looking Southeast over Abrek
-Looking Northeast over Katarsis
-Looking North over Schlepogora
-Looking South over Lithead
-Looking Southwest over Bergburg
-Looking Southwest over Jollity
-Looking North-northeast from Fort Candycane
-Looking East-southeast from Fort Fortitude
-Looking East-southeast from Mount Toastypops
-Looking North from the Splatterhorn

There are 60 Specification B fortresses, located approximately 70-80 kilometres apart throughout Kalgachia (except the Lieutenancy of Lepidopterum), interspersed by a further 180 cosmetic decoy sites.

Ludd MRBM Launch Site (12 personnel)
There are 60 Ludd launch sites throughout Kalgachia, each of which houses four Ludd MRBMs and sixteen launch-phase penetration aids. Among the launch sites are a further 60 cosmetic decoy sites.

There are 3 Artillery Trains located around the Kalgachi railway network, supplemented by a further 9 decoy trains.

Fire Division

The Fire Division is the KDF's main air assault unit, conceived as a substitute for armour and mechanised infantry in Kalgachia's mountainous topography. Created after much lobbying by persistent quarters of the Kalgachi government who cited the operational successes of Kasterburg's Luchtmobiele Brigade, the Fire Division is notable for being the only unit in the KDF capable of pulling a division-sized logistical tail faster than the speed of a pack horse. The Division is thought to be the priority recipient of Kalgachia's painstakingly-accumulated hydrocarbon fuel stockpiles.

KDF Reserve

The Kalgachi Defence Force Reserve (KDFR) was split from the Church Partisans in 199 AL, to relieve the KDF's full-time units from logistical support and general security duties in the Northbloom Protectorate. Each KDF reservist spends one month per year on active duty - in peacetime some 77,000 troops are active at any one time, with the remaining 847,000 in civilian life awaiting their annual rotation. KDF reservists are only marginally better armed than their partisan counterparts but receive better training in a formal military environment - their duties in peacetime include military road and rail transport, running messages, guarding garrisons, operating and maintaining decoys, disaster relief, and quelling civil disorder on behalf of the Prefects.

The KDFR is disposed as follows:

1st Reserve Army (Centre)
- Lieutenancy of Oktavyan: 2,520 Reserve Companies of which 210 are active in peacetime.
- Lieutenancy of Jollity: 840 Reserve Companies of which 70 are active in peacetime.

2nd Reserve Army (North)
- Lieutenancy of Abrek: 840 Reserve Companies of which 70 are active in peacetime.
- Lieutenancy of Katarsis: 1,260 Reserve Companies of which 105 are active in peacetime.
- Lieutenancy of Bergburg: 840 Reserve Companies of which 70 are active in peacetime.

3rd Reserve Army (South)
- Lieutenancy of Schlepogora: 1,680 Reserve Companies of which 140 are active in peacetime.
- Lieutenancy of Lithead: 1,260 Reserve Companies of which 105 are active in peacetime.

Non-Combatant Elements

In addition to its combat function the KDF effectively functions as the Kalgachi defence ministry (a consequence of its unseen Supreme Commander being one of Kalgachia's ruling Council of Perfecti, thus assuming overall responsibility for the coordination of national defence). This has resulted in a large non-combatant staff which dwarfs the size of the force's combat elements, allowing aged soldiers of even the lowest rank to sustain their careers past the age of frontline fitness. The arrangement also allows valuable experience from non-commissioned and junior officers to percolate through the command structure and mix with insights from the civilian world.

General Staff

There are three duplicate KDF General Staffs, each located in its own redundant deep-level underground command rhizome. Overall command of the KDF is periodically switched between these rhizomes for the purpose of staff experience or operational need. The exact location of these rhizomes - respectively codenamed GLACIS, WESTNEST and FLORID is a closely guarded secret. Each command rhizome is comprised of the following elements:

Intelligence Command

Intelligence Command gathers and interprets operationally-pertinent information, specialising particularly in the Open Source (OSINT) and Measurement and Signature (MASINT) branches of the craft. In addition the command maintains an extensive deception complex comprised of decoy military structures running into the hundreds along with spurious signals traffic, disinformation leakage, misleading vehicle movements and other falsely-generated signatures of a spectrographic, gravimetric, seismic and topographical nature.

Logistics Command

Logistics Command deals with the provision and storage of KDF supplies. It is a relatively invisible command - most of its production and storage facilities are deep underground. Once produced, movements of KDF supplies are generally left to the embedded logistical detachments of their destination units to avert the force nullification hazard of enemy action upon seperate supply formations. To ease the travel time required by combat units to collect supplies, Logistics Command maintains a network of concealed caches and ammunition dumps across Kalgachia. While working well on home ground, this supply arrangement does entail a substantial dropoff in KDF unit endurance when operating outside friendly territory - with the exception of special operations units, cossacks and other elements skilled in foraging and looting.

Training Command

Training Command maintains premises across Kalgachia for the development and refreshment of the KDF's fighting skills. These vary in size from small office buildings to enormous garrisons. Unlike most of the KDF's estate, Training Command's installations are located on or near the surface to allow easy transit to and from training manoeuvres. Regardless of their assigned trade, all KDF recruits undergo initial instruction at the School of Basic Training and Infantry Warfare in Katarsis City where they learn physical fitness, drill, weapon handling and other rudiments of military life before proceeding through other venues to complete their training regime.

Training Command is composed of:

- Kalgachi Central War College (Oktavyan)- Partisan Instructors' College (Abrek)- Infantry Warfare College

School of Basic Training and Infantry Warfare (Katarsis)

School of Mountain Warfare (Fort Fortitude)

School of Underground and Urban Warfare (Oktavyan)

- School of Mobile Warfare and Animal Husbandry (Schlepogora)- School of Artillery (Kossarstadt)- School of Air Defence, Electronic Warfare and Military Intelligence (Bergburg)

- School of Combat Aviation (Fort Candycane)- School of Biomic Warfare and Special Operations (Lithead)- School of Logistics (Mirth)- School of Battlefield Medicine, Chaplaincy and Catering (Jollity)- School of Music (Jollity)- School of Administrative Services (Oktavyan)

Provost Marshal's Office

The Prefects' Border Guard Service

Formed in 150 AL, the Prefects' Border Guard Service (PBGS) is the most visible element of Kalgachia's internal security apparatus. In addition to the usual retinue of customs and immigration staff, the PBGS operates 342 armed Frontier Patrol Units (one for every 10km of the Kalgachi Frontier), each numbering 64 personnel and four attack dogs. Although these units are primarily intended to intercept individuals or small groups violating the Kalgachi border, their light firepower is augmented by an intimate knowledge of the Kalgachi frontier area and an aptitude for covert field reconnaissance second only to the KDF Special Purpose Regiment. They have also preserved certain strains of engineered flora from the Minarborian era - namely the notorious triad of Dreadnettle (urtica terribilis), Sharpshooter Primrose (primula ballistis) and Shrapnel Lily (lilium discerptionis), and have continued the Minarborian tradition of sowing these species into belts of 'biomic minefield' immediately behind the Kalgachia frontier. The periphery of these areas require periodic clearance to prevent the violent flora's uncontrolled spread into Kalgachia proper - a delicate task in itself and one for which the PBGS keeps a cadre of skilled gardeners, usually Nezeni specialists from the Lieutenancy of Lithead in Kalgachia's south.

Total PBGS Field Assets

Church Partisans

Church Partisans on manoeuvres, somewhere in the Lieutenancy of Oktavyan.

For all the KDF's fighting skill, it is not numerous enough to present effective resistance to an enemy attacking along the entire length of the Kalgachi frontier; so, as in Minarboria, every Church parish selects a portion of its able-bodied citizenry for mobilisation as partisans in a time of total war. Although numbers fluctuate within and between each parish, the total manpower (and womanpower) of such fighters is thought to be around 3,700,000.

Over the course of many years, between more ordinary Church activities, those of the congregation selected as partisans undergo the following twelve-step programme of instruction by training cadres from the KDF:

Kalgachi partisans are much mocked and maligned by the enlisted ranks of the KDF for their perceived lack of professionalism and delusions of martial grandeur - but their asymmetric doctrine, intimate knowledge of home ground and sheer numbers are quietly recognised by the KDF officer corps as of genuine military value in the event of a major war; if nothing else, the partisans' generous sprinkling of small arms and explosive caches maintained in every Kalgachi parish - the keys to which reside with the parish Credent and a trusted few of his congregation - give the KDF a valuable backup on home ground in the event of a collapse in their own supply chain.

In addition to their wartime function, each Parish keeps a proportion of its partisans mobilised in peacetime for the purposes of maintaining public order, firefighting and medical evacuation. The competence and professionalism of these formations vary in broad correlation with the density of the surrounding habitation, ranging from trained and uniformed full-time volunteers in the larger cities to licensed thugs and extortionists in the backwater parishes of the Laqi east.

The Northbloom Dragoons are the locally-recruited standing military force of the Northbloom Protectorate. Due to the Protectorate's special status, the unit enjoys a high degree of autonomy even by Kalgachi standards - instead of taking an oath to Kalgachia's ruling Council of Perfecti, the Highbloom Dragoons adhere solely to the command of the Kalgachi-appointed Lord Protector of Highbloom on behalf of Lord Mondo Etzeterra.

The unit claims the 3rd oldest lineage[2][3] of any unit under Kalgachi command, by virtue of inheriting antiquated hardware and certain doctrinal habits from the 2nd Northern Frontier Division of Minarboria. Its two constituent regiments are named for Mondo's parents, Marquess Clarence Etzeterra of &zeter and Princess Octavia of Highbloom.

The Northbloom Dragoons are thought to be the only military unit on Micras with more horses than people - an inevitable consequence of the region's physical and geopolitical isolation preventing the reliable supply of high-power hydrocarbon motor fuels required for a viable mechanised force. Those few incoming fuel shipments which escape diversion to the more pressing needs of the KDF are used to power the Dragoons' small collection of Minarborian-era self-propelled SAM complexes.

References

^A legacy name - the school's original director is believed to have been dismissed on suspicion of introducing subtle misinformation to the curriculum, resulting in the compromise of several DTW Field Researchers in 174 AL. His subsequent fate is unknown, as is the identity of his successor(s).

^The KDF's 1st Underground Regiment can allegedly trace its origins to Lywinder mercenaries of the Neridian Enterprise, Shireroth's ill-fated effort to colonise the Isle of Istvanistan. If the mess-bar boasts of the unit are to be believed, a direct line of operational succession links the Neridian colonist army to the Royal Expeditionary Force raised by Lyssansa Rossheim to secure the foundational teritory of Minarboria under the command of the eternally-benighted Mors Nerrolar, thence evolving into the elite Black Rangers whose shattered remnants ultimately surrendered to Kalgachi forces during Operation Credulity's Edge, spearheading the creation of Kalgachia's first underground/urban combat unit upon their naturalisation in the country.

^The KDF's 1st Cossack Regiment Z.M. Karymov claims direct descent from a detachment of Laqi bodyguards hired from the Khanate of Karalakh by the paranoid Count of Lunaris, Stellus Yastreb, in the latter days of his family's residence in Shireroth. It is worth noting that the regiment continues to provide close protection services to the House of Yastreb, citing an "eternal contract" of somewhat nebulous terms.